Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a technique of recognizing another communication apparatus by a communication apparatus.
Description of the Related Art
A wireless communication system using a wireless LAN represented by the IEEE802.11 standard has been widely used. In the wireless LAN, a base station called an access point (to be referred to as an “AP” hereinafter) often controls a wireless network. A wireless network is formed by the AP and stations (to be referred to as “STAs” hereinafter) which fall within the radio wave coverage of the AP and are in a wirelessly connected state.
In recent years, products and standards for various network forms of the wireless LAN have appeared on the market, in addition to this conventional simple wireless network configuration of the AP and STAs. In Wi-Fi Direct, one of the communication apparatuses that are communicating becomes a P2P group owner (to be referred to as a “GO” herein after) which operates as a base station like the AP. The other communication apparatus becomes a P2P client (to be referred to as a “client” hereinafter) which operates as a terminal station like the STA. Wireless communication is established between the GO and the client, and communication is performed.
Wi-Fi Direct services are available as a standard obtained by extending Wi-Fi Direct. In Wi-Fi Direct services, a communication apparatus exchanges, with another communication apparatus, information about supported services before establishing wireless connection. As a result, the communication apparatus can learn in advance about the types of services that are provided and can be used. Services in this case can include, for example, a print service, a file transmission/reception service, transmission/playback of various kinds of media data such as an image or a video, a screen streaming service, and the like. In addition, an original service provided by a vendor can also be defined.
On the other hand, Wi-Fi® NAN (Neighbor Awareness Networking) standard is a standard for discovering a communication apparatus and a service provided by it with low power consumption. In NAN, the communication apparatus synchronizes an information exchange period with the other communication apparatus to shorten the time necessary to enable the wireless RF related to the information exchange. Hence, the communication apparatus can exchange, with low power consumption, the service information with the other apparatus (see U.S. Patent Application Publication No. 2015/0036540).
Different service discovery mechanisms are used for Wi-Fi Direct services and Wi-Fi NAN, and only a communication apparatus that complies with one of the standards can be discovered. Hence, if a communication apparatus and a service provided by it are searched using Wi-Fi Direct services, only a communication apparatus complying with the Wi-Fi Direct services can be discovered. On the other hand, if a communication apparatus and a service provided by it are searched using Wi-Fi NAN, only a communication apparatus complying with the Wi-Fi NAN can be discovered. On the other hand, in some cases, a user may not want to search for a communication apparatus that complies with a predetermined standard, but may simply want to discover a communication apparatus that provides a predetermined service. Hence, in some cases, user convenience could not be satisfied by performing separate searches using the respective conventional standards.
The present invention provides a technique capable of discovering another communication apparatus which complies with one of a plurality of standards by a single user operation.